Are you Scroll Searching?

I’ve come up with a new phrase…instead of ‘soul searching’ I’m scroll searching. Moving my fingers over and over a screen looking for what exactly?

I’ve spent years searching in practices, books, yoga workshops, retreats and courses only to discover that looking was pointless.

Wherever I am. There I am.

No amount of scroll searching can answer the biggest questions. Unless we are lucky enough to find a true teacher in the tradition. Atma Vidya has been solving our greatest questions for generations.

The thing is we’ve never known where to look.

And the noise of ignorance is only getting louder. People are unhappy because there is nothing but unhappiness everywhere. That’s what’s so ironic. It’s not unhappiness looking for happiness. It’s happiness not knowing its happy thinking it must look in the first place.

The search for happiness denies that I am the happiness. The search for meaning denies that I am the meaning. The search for oneself denies that I am one Self.

But words mean nothing because even reading this, I am the best editor! Editing out what I don’t want to read. Or already deciding I know exactly what’s being written about.

The first thing I learned from my teacher was that Self has a language. And like learning any new language the true meaning in each word needs to be understood.

Think of the word water…what comes to mind? Wet, ocean, cool, purifying, smooth, thirsty, flowing. How many words can I use to describe water? But what is water? The word is a symbol for the indescribable.

How to describe the indescribable? The teacher of Atma Vidya uses words for which there is only meaning, no words. The teachings point out what I am not, to reveal who I am.

And where does the teaching begin? With the macrocosmic universe? With my role in the universe? Or with me?

To analyse the ocean do I pour the whole ocean into a test tube? Of course not. I use a tiny drop. The drop contains the ocean.

In the same way, with the help of a teacher, putting myself, specifically the word I use to describe myself (first person singular) under the microscope, I discover the nature of who I am.

If I ask myself, who am I? I’ll most likely never figure it out. But if I ask what is this “I”? The answer is surprisingly simple.

“I” is the nature of the knower. Not, I do, I make, I have… but pure untouched “I”, awareness, consciousness in whose presence the idea I have of myself plays out.

The word “I” represents the macrocosm and the microcosm. How can I be both?

Am I standing in the space of my room? Or standing in the infinite space of the universe? How far away am I from space? If space is infinite and the body is occupying space, how far is the body from the infinite. But am I my body? The body is inert. It has no sense of “I”. I do.

So how far is “I” from the space of infinity. “I” has no form, I can’t touch, taste, smell hear or see “I”. I only know that I exist. I cannot deny my existence. If I wasn’t here, would I even question my existence?

Existence is effortless. I take my existence for granted. It’s easier to get lost in my thoughts, ideas and experiences taking them to be reality then to acknowledge the experiencer. The knower. Just like existence is effortless. Knowing is also effortless.

If I ask myself, “ How do I know?” I reply “ I just know!”

No matter what miracles science can discover, No scientist can tell us how we know what we know. Also have you ever wondered where knowing began?

It’s easy to think knowing begins with me! So, knowing begins from birth? But every human being is not the first. We are born in the middle of an ongoing stream of knowledge. Ongoing stream of existence. We don’t choose our parents, where we are born, what colour eyes we have, what our face looks like. We have no choice in anything including when we die. Life as a human being is not a choice we make. We just find ourselves here.

There’s a lovely story from the tradition.

When Buddha was born White elephants appeared, the trees blossomed and bowed their heads. When Jesus was born, the kings came from the east with magnificent gifts, the star appeared in the east to guide their way to the manger. But when you and I were born? Everyone just carried on watching the TV! But make no mistake, if TV’s were around in the time of Buddha or Jesus, everyone would have just carried on watching their favourite show too. Life just carries on normally.

Knowing is as ordinary as it comes. The ability to know is the common denominator. The beauty of knowledge is that, once a teacher points out the ordinariness of existence knowing that the one appearing to exist, and existence itself are one and the same: OneSelf. Needing to know what and who is existing falls away. The search for the truth falls away.

Then, as our teacher often shares, “Enjoy the Buffet!” Knowing oneself as the changeless in all the changes I choose; do I want to be a drop? Or do I want to be the ocean? It’s all up to each and every one of us.

With great respect…

Rachel

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